No jail for 'affluenza' teen in fatal crash draws outrage

In a case with growing political ripples, a Texas judge's reaffirmation placing a teen involved in a drunken-driving fatal accident on probation is drawing fresh outrage from the victims' families.

Ethan Couch, 17, will be on 10 years probation after Texas District Judge Jean Boyd again decided against jail time. He'll also be in a drug and rehab center for an unspecified time. Couch's attorneys used an "affluenza" defense at his trial last year, saying the then 16-year-old had grown up with a sense of entitlement and developed poor judgment after being coddled by his wealthy parents.

Prosecutors said Couch's blood-alcohol level was three times the Texas legal limit when his pickup slammed into a group of people who were helping a woman with a stalled car last June. The driver, Breanna Mitchell, and bystanders Brian Jennings, Hollie Boyes and daughter Shelby, were killed. Nine others were injured.

According to police, Couch was going 70 mph in a 40 mph zone when he lost control of his father's pickup and his blood alcohol content was 0.24. The state's legal limit for adults is 0.08. Couch had been cited earlier in 2013 for being a minor in possession of alcohol and consuming alcohol as a minor, pleading no contest to both charges in a March hearing.

Couch, who pleaded earlier to four counts of intoxication manslaughter, was back in court this week after prosecutors again sought a 20-year jail term related to the crash. But in a hearing closed to the media, Boyd reaffirmed her earlier sentence.

Psychologist G. Dick Miller testified at Couch's trial that the you was given "freedoms no young person should have" and that he felt no rational link between behavior and consequences. Miller has since regretting using the term affluenza.

"This kid had medical problems, he had social anxiety disorder, he had all sorts of things. He had depression. He found alcohol was his medicine," Miller said in a December interview. "I think that term, 'affluenza,' which I was just using to describe what we used to call spoiled brats, it's not a diagnosis."

Two Texas gubernatorial candidates have spoken out on the case, while court observers and psychologists say the affluenza defense could be used in future cases involving juveniles, sending a dangerous message that could reinforce reckless behavior and poor judgment.

Victims' family members remain outraged.

"No matter where he goes ... no matter what game he and his family think they've beaten ... the world is not ever going to take their eyes off of him," said Marla Mitchell, Breanna's mother. "Let's let them know that no amount of money or prestige is ever going to grant them immunity for what they chose for their life that caused this for our lives."

Eric Boyles, who lost his wife and daughter in the accident, said news media should have been allowed in the juvenile court hearing.

"If anything, the ability to tamp this down, keep this quiet, let this go away is absolutely the wrong thing to do. Absolutely this story has to go on,'' he said.

The case could be a hot-button political issue. Democratic gubernatorial candidate Wendy Davis has called Boyd's decision a disgrace. And Attorney General Greg Abbott, a Republican contender, said he's trying to determine if Couch's sentence can be appealed.

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, who serves as president of the Senate, has already asked for a sentencing guideline study of intoxication manslaughter cases.

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Source: US Today (Strauss, 2/06)

Penalties for Hit and Run Rise in Texas

With new laws increasing the penalties for drivers involved in hit-and-run fatalities or those who fail to stop and render aid, advocates are hoping that Texas drivers have a greater incentive to stay at the scene of accidents and help the injured.

Starting Sept. 1, the penalty for hit-and-run fatalities will be equal to that for intoxicated manslaughter. Currently, it is a third-degree felony, carrying a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. The new law raises the offense to a second-degree felony, with a maximum penalty of 20 years. Another new law makes failure to stop and render aid after an accident that may have caused injury punishable by up to 10 years.

"There was a perverse incentive to leave the scene of a wreck if you were intoxicated" because the penalties for intoxication were higher, said Bill Lewis, a spokesman for Mothers Against Drunk Driving. The legislation, he said, "gives people a reason to hang around."

Legislation on the new punishment passed easily with bipartisan support, which is uncommon, said state Rep. Elliott Naishtat, D-Austin, who was a sponsor of the legislation on stopping and rendering aid. Some legislators "don't like to mess with enhancing penalties," he said, but many were swayed by the trial of Gabrielle Nestande, a former legislative staff member who was accused of the 2011 hit-and-run death of Courtney Griffin, 30, in Austin. Nestande was arrested the morning after the accident and told the police that she did not know she had hit Griffin.

Nestande was found guilty of criminally negligent homicide but acquitted on charges of intoxication manslaughter, manslaughter, and failure to stop and render aid.

Commander Donald Daker of the Austin Police Department described the Nestande case as a "perfect illustration" of the challenges facing prosecutors in such cases. "If you look at it from an investigative perspective, it's very difficult to prove intoxicated manslaughter when you’ve got to go back hours or days later when they finally do identify who the suspected driver was," Daker said.

The laws will aid prosecution of similar trials, Naishtat said, by encouraging drivers to stay at the scene where blood alcohol levels can be measured.

Requiring drivers to stop and render aid could mean the difference between life and death, Lewis said. A telephone call made within minutes rather than hours of an accident could mean "the person who was hurt would have a better chance to recover," he said.

The legislation corrects outdated laws, said mother Laurie Griffin, who advocated the bill's passage.

"You can't just say, 'I thought it was a kid throwing rocks at my car' and change your story to 'I thought I hit a deer,'" Laurie Griffin said, a reference to reasons that Nestande gave in the courtroom for leaving the scene. "People need to know what's going to happen if they don't stop, and that's from a mother that lost her daughter to complete nonsense."

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Source: KEYE TV (AP, 8/09)

History of Safety Violations at Texas Fertilizer Plant

The residents of West, Texas are recovering from a horrific industrial accident that took the lives of at least 14 people, many of whom were volunteer firefighters, and wounded hundreds of others, some severely. Most tragically of all, the blast, heard from up to 40 miles away, could have been prevented entirely had proper safety precautions been in place at the plant. The fact that they weren’t, and government agencies failed to act, is a simultaneous indictment of valuing money over people and the critical need for reform at agencies charged with the safety of workers and the environment.

This timeline of inspections, violations and fines at the West Fertilizer Company will shock you:

1985: Last Occupational Health and Safety (OSHA) inspection.

OSHA, the government agency charged with looking out for worker health, last visited the plant almost 30 years ago. One serious and two additional violations, for which the company was fined a whopping $30, were found during the site visit. Why the long delay? The United States has over seven million workplaces, and OSHA’s inspectors, of which there are only 2,000 to cover the whole country, can’t keep up due to a lack of training and funding.

The sequester has only made this worse, by limiting accessibility of critically-needed funds for hiring and training inspectors, holding more random inspections and keeping workplaces safe. Consequently, OSHA tends to inspect only when there’s been a complaint, which means that a worker has to be brave enough to file one. Even with anonymous whistleblower laws to protect them, workers are well aware of the risks of reprisal.

2006: Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) and Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) site visit and fines.

After receiving complaints about air quality at the site, government representatives noted that the company lacked permits for its two 12,000 gallon anhydrous ammonia (a flammable and toxic substance) tanks as well as for loading and storing dry components of fertilizer. A notice was issued to ask the company to get into compliance with the permits, which it did.

The EPA also expressed concerns about the West Fertilizer Company’s Risk-Management Program (RMP), required for such facilities. These concerns included worries that the plan was outdated, and that it had no documentation regarding what it intended to do in order to address safety concerns. A new plan was filed five years later to get in compliance. Amazingly, the plant claimed that it didn’t have any explosive or flammable materials on site, and didn’t list fire among potential safety risks in the workplace.

2007: Final TCEQ site visit.

The final followup visit regarding the earlier air quality complaint was also the last time workplace safety officials came to the site. Due to the plant’s comparatively small size, it was rarely inspected, with regulators focusing on getting inspectors to larger facilities and those that received complaints. It’s possible that TCEQ inspectors might not have visited the site at all in 2006 and 2007 if a member of the public hadn’t complained about an unpleasant odor.

2012: U.S. Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration fine.

Last year, the company was fined $10,000 for failing to have an adequate security plan in place for the transportation of hazardous materials. As is common with government fines, the amount was negotiated down by almost half: it paid just $5,250 after agreeing that it would embark on a course of corrective action to address the problem.

2013: Office of the State Chemist site visit.

Texas’ Office of the State Chemist focuses on materials blending, labeling and purity. Inspectors found no problems during a site visit in April, but they also weren’t looking for workplace safety violations, of which they undoubtedly would have found many. The fact that regulators visited the site 10 days before the explosion and didn’t notice anything that might draw concern highlights how harried many officials are as they work quickly to get from site to site, focusing on the obvious facets of their jobs without taking a step back. Chemists inspecting the plant should have been wondering about the conditions there.

Think this is bad? Ramit Plushnick-Masti and Jack Gillum, reporting for the AP, note that: “There were no sprinklers. No firewalls. No water deluge systems.” Without such basic fire suppression systems, once the plant started to go, it was almost unstoppable, and the fire spread quickly through the facility without any walls to keep it in check. This made the accident even more devastating than it could have been, and endangered the lives of first responders who arrived on scene to help victims.

An investigation is ongoing into the circumstances of this terrible event, but the outcome of that investigation is already obvious: overworked government agencies failed to catch a serious safety problem, and negligence on the part of a factory owner resulted in the development of hazardous conditions.

The question is: will he be held accountable, and will Congress take a critically-needed lesson here and increase funding to government agencies charged with our safety?

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Source: Care2 (Smith, 4/20)